Former President Donald Trump is trying to convey a message to major Republican donors: Indictment or no, I’m still the best horse in this race. In making that case before Republican National Committee donors on Saturday, he opted to ditch his preferred topic — the number of ways he’s been wronged over the years — to focus on what a second term would bring.
A willingness to move on from 2020 is definitely what donors want to hear right now.
This newfound desire to look toward the future included a pitch to return him to office “through electoral strategies he once decried, like robust mail-in voting and ballot harvesting,” according to Politico, which obtained a copy of his remarks. At first it looked like a potential major shift in strategy with implications for races up and down the ballot next year. But any hope for the GOP to regain lost ground on that front doesn’t stand a chance against Trump’s worst instincts.
A willingness to move on from 2020 is definitely what donors want to hear right now. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has been seen as Trump’s biggest competition for the Republican nomination, has been slipping as of late among the party’s patricians, likely due at least in part to his ongoing play for the far-right populist wing of the base. Ironically, given the race to the bottom between the two front-runners, billionaire Thomas Peterffy recently told the Financial Times that because of DeSantis’ “stance on abortion and book banning . . . myself, and a bunch of friends, are holding our powder dry.”
So when I first saw the Politico story Sunday night, I wondered how long this supposedly new focus could possibly last. By Monday morning, I had my answer: about 48 hours, at most. In a 2 a.m. post on his Truth Social account, Trump lambasted Fox News for not admitting “IF FOX WOULD FINALLY ADMIT THAT THERE WAS LARGE SCALE CHEATING & IRREGULARITIES IN THE 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION,” adding that “THERE IS SOOO MUCH…
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